18 May 2016

Make your tweets more accessible

Calling all Twitter users! Do you want to make your tweets more accessible to your blind and partially-sighted followers? Twitter has recently introduced a new and simple feature to make tweeted images more accessible…

By giving users the option of adding descriptions (known as ‘alt-text’) to images in tweets, Twitter has taken significant steps to making social media a more equal and accessible environment for all users.

As Twitter says in its blog announcing the move, photos “have been at the center of some of the biggest moments on Twitter”. Previously, Twitter’s many blind and partially sighted users have been excluded from these moments… however, this latest update enables users to include everyone in the debate.

How to…

It’s fairly simple to enable on both the Twitter App and the website. Just go to Settings, then Accessibility, and then enable the feature by ticking the ‘compose image description’ box.

When you next add an image to a tweet,  Twitter will give you the option of adding alt-text via its ‘add description button’. Click on this button to add text describing the image. Descriptions are limited to 420 characters. People can then access these descriptions when using assistive technology, such as screen readers.

Making images accessible in Braille, Audio and other formats

For details about making documents accessible for people who are blind and partially-sighted, visit our website to find out about Braille, Audio, Large Print and E Text formats. Or contact us for a chat – we’re a friendly bunch and would be happy to help!

Photo by Marten Bjork on Unsplash